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Former IFL welterweight Jay Hieron had to wait nearly six months to make his debut for Affliction, so what was a few more hours? However, Hieron had to battle and keep his focus after getting warmed up to fight in a televised bout during HDNet’s undercard at this past Saturday’s “Day of Reckoning” event against Jason High only to be told he would have to wait until after the show to fight.

Still in the United States, the fighter spoke with TATAME.com about his future in the event and revealed: his plans, now, also involve the professional Boxing. "It was perfect. I trained hard, was so focused that nothing was going through my min. Now I’ll start to fight professional Boxing. I’ll have a meeting with Oscar de La Hoya and we’ll see that. It has no mystery", said Vitor, who also celebrated the victory over Matt, Renato "Babalu” and Rogério Nogueira’s victories, the dream of fighting against Fedor Emelianenko and more.

By all appearances the Affliction 2 card was a rousing success. Over 13,000 fans packed the Honda Center to see a very good fight card highlighted by Fedor Emelianenko's dramatic win over Andrei Arlovski. Vitor Belfort's knockout of Matt Lindland was unreal. Paul Buentello gave a boxing lesson to Kiril Sidelnikov. Babalu's precision against Sokoudjou was fun to watch. And even Gilbert Yvel fighting as well he did on the bottom of a mount for three rounds, was intriguing. Yahoo! Sports' Kevin Iole reported that the event had a paid attendance of 8,946 with $1,512,750 gate.
Affliction VP Tom Atencio was beaming afterwards but is proceeding with caution. He threw out an interesting line during the post-fight press conference (Full audio here):
"These guys are the ones. These guys are the warriors. They put their lives on the line and fight and train hard," Atencio before a long pause. "Hopefully, there's someone out there who can give them another home and hopefully that will continue to be us."

More than an hour after his third-round submission loss to Josh Barnett, Gilbert Yvel took his seat at the "Affliction: Day of Reckoning" post-event press conference.
Despite a swollen face, busted lip and trickles of blood coming from his mouth, the heavyweight fighter was neither dejected nor remorseful.
In fact, for a fighter heavily criticized for his past in-fight antics, the slight smile coming from Yvel's busted mug almost gave a sense of relief.

Let me tell you, Dan was not looking for any kind of break for anything other than recovering his balls from his throat. Dan is the most stubborn kid I have ever met in my life. He does not want any shortcuts in anything and wants to earn everything he gets. He clearly got kicked in the balls and he took the amount of time he was given. If I got kicked in the balls I wouldn’t want to tie me own shoes, nevermind go out and fight. It happens in fighting and in some cases you don’t need the full time. In other cases, you do…and this was one of those cases. I honestly cannot believe how much **** Dan is catching over this. He gets fouled and then when he takes his time to recover he is the one that’s wrong? He got hit in the nuts and he took his time to recover. That’s it. Its not out fault Bobby Green consistently had terrible accuracy and hit Dan in the balls 3 times. After the third one, they gave Dan the option of the easy win. They told Dan that Bobby would be DQ’ed if he didn’t want to continue. If Dan was looking for an easy way out, he would have said he didn’t want to continue and take the easy win. It would have been the smart move, he could have collected his money and gone home with a win. Instead, he went out and showed those HUGE BALLS and finished the fight like a man.

"He's obviously got unbelievable potential, but he had some distractions getting ready for this fight. The movie. The commercials. If Fedor wants to keep winning, and winning well, he needs to train professionally. Right now he won with his old tricks.
"The fact that Fedor won, don't get me wrong, I'm very happy about. But he won this fight because of the training before this fight. The experience he had before this fight. The trainers did everything we could to get him ready. But for title fights, we can't train the way we trained for this one."

Here are post fight quotes from the winners of Affliction Day of Reckoning. Fedor talks about capitalizing on Arlovski's mistakes, Barnett talks about his performance, and Dan Lauzon makes mentions of the low blows by Bobby Green. Some interesting quotes in case anyone hasn't seen

For a brief moment during Saturday's "Affliction: Day of Reckoning" main event in Anaheim, Calif., Fedor Emelianenko (29-1) looked almost human.
Apparently frustrated by the effective striking, long reach and rapid speed of challenger Andrei Arlovski (14-6), Emelianenko looked wounded in the corner, and "The Pitbull" smelled blood.
Then suddenly, and with little warning, a crushing right hand flattened Arlovski and immediately returned Emelianenko's mystique. During the post-event press conference, the Russian champion said that despite appearances, he was firmly in control throughout the 194 seconds he needed to destroy the world's second-best heavyweight.

“Wow! That’s all I got to say. Vitor at 185 pounds. I don’t know. I see him beating the, uh, what was it, Anderson Silva. I see him picking him apart because you have two great boxers, and, man, that was amazing. That was the old Vitor Belfort that we all want to see. Him at 131 years old. He’s back for vengeance.”

… to attend and help promote “Day of Reckoning” — a venture that his Golden Boy Promotions backed — rather than sit ringside at a big boxing match that aired on HBO that same night.
Here’s the Merchant rant via MMA Insider Blog:
“A celebrity who is here in bronze only [referring to a bronze statue of Oscar De La Hoya that stands outside the Staples Center]. Oscar De La Hoya, the live version, is in nearby Anaheim, where his company got a $5 million fee from a t-shirt maker so that he would be personally involved the promotion of a mixed martial arts show.It would take that much, Jim, to get me to go to one of those things.”

The CSAC has released the disclosed fighter payouts from last night's Affliction 2 event. The total disclosed payouts were $3,308,000 with the lion's share-$1,500,000-going to main event loser Andrei Arlovski. That figure does not include a bonus going to Fedor, rumored to be over $1 million. Affliction claimed a live gate of 13,228 paid, but that has not been confirmed by the CSAC.

It took nearly all three rounds, but Josh Barnett – at Saturday night's "Day of Reckoning" in Anaheim, Calif. – earned his shot at the WAMMA heavyweight title. He thoroughly dominated Gilbert Yvel, taking him down throughout and unleashing a relentless barrage of punches, hammerfists, and forearms. It wasn't until the waning moments of the final round, however, before Barnett overwhelmed Yvel with his onslaught, causing the Dutch fighter to tap out.

For three minutes, Andrei Arlovski appeared that he had finally cracked the code to the world's greatest heavyweight. In the end, he only found a chink in Fedor Emelianenko's armor, not a way to pierce his heart.
Arlovski had the reach advantage in this fight. He had the speed advantage. He was elusive. And true to the pre-fight words of his boxing trainer, Freddie Roach, he appeared to have Fedor frustrated, something rarely seen in the Russian's demeanor.
There was even a trickle of blood flowing from Fedor's nose.

This weekend Affliction will host their second ever event, which as the first will also be headlined by undefeated heavyweight phenom Fedor Emelianenko. The former PRIDE champion and current WAMMA champion will face off against former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei Arlovski.
The card will also feature PRIDE’s 2006 Open-Weight Grand Prix finalist Josh Barnett against the highly controversial striker Gilbert Yvel, as well as “Baby Fedor” Kiril Sidelnikov against former UFC heavyweight contender Paul Buentello, and late replacement Bobby Green against WCF veteran Dan Lauzon.
The main card, which will air live on pay-per-view, is rounded out with top ten middleweight Matt Lindland against Vitor Belfort and Strikeforce’s light heavyweight champion Renato “Babalu” Sobral against PRIDE and UFC veteran Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou. The HDNet-hosted preliminary card will feature PRIDE veteran Antonio Rogerio Nogueira against IFL champion Vladimir Matyushenko, L.C. Davis against Bao Quach (who fights as a late-notice replacement for Mark Hominick), and IFL welterweight champion Jay Hieron against Jason High.

Mike Reilly (Team Bison) – “There are two very different Andrei Arloski’s. One is really an average fighter who panics under pressure – the other is a stone cold killer with the hands of a top 10 pro boxer, the skills of a world class grappler, and the mind of a rapid Pitbull on crack who just found someone banging his wife on Christmas morning. This Andrei could be the best one the planet. This Andrei can drop any man, at anytime. His straight right is a king maker. There is only one Fedor. The quintessential Russian fighter. He can beat you with overwhelming forces. He can beat you with guile. And he can take a beating so server that it would kill a dozen lesser men. The saying goes that “Russians are born to bleed, but never die.” I foresee a long drawn out bloody civil war. This may be the fight that makes most of the world turn away as every vodka loving son of a bitch watches that much closer. In the end I see Fedor outlasting the Pitbull. Draining him and finishing him last in the fight as a non-Russian ref finally puts and end to the fight. However if the Pitbull lands that clean straight right we will see the last legend of the sport fall.”

Josh Barnett & Renato 'Babalu' Sobral Leading up to Affliction 'Day of Reckoning'

PDG: So much to lose by taking this fight and not much to win. Why did you as a top 3 Heavyweight in the world take this fight? Barnett: Because it’s a fight; Plain and simple. I can wait around to fight one guy and let my career pass me by or I can get in there and do what I love to do: commit murder.

John Hackleman: Fedor by overhand right.
Cung Le: Fedor by decision.
Patrick Cote: I’ll go with Fedor by submission in the second round.
Pros that picked Fedor to win: 26
Pros that picked Arlovski to win: 4